J.T. Poston hasn’t exactly been a world-beater on the PGA Tour.
He had just five career top 10s and only two this season.
Poston started Sunday’s final round at the Wyndham Championship three shots behind overnight leader Ben An. Poston, a North Carolina native from Hickory, went right to work and got his day jump-started with a 13-foot eagle putt at the fifth hole. He made the turn five-under and at 19-under was in the thick of the fight going to the final nine.
An, who nearly ruined his chance for victory at the par five 15th at Sedgefield on Saturday, survived a wild tee shot on that hole in round three but that same hole would come back to bite him hard on Sunday.
Poston, playing just in from of An and Webb Simpson, birdied the 15th to get to 22-under and turned up the heat on An.
Once again, An drove it into the high fescue to the right at 15, took an unplayable, missed the green with his third then hit a poor pitch from right of the green that led to bogey.
Suddenly, Poston led by two. He finished with three pars then waited to see how An would finish. An did bounce back with a birdie at the 16th to get within a shot but couldn’t get another. At the 18th, he was 50 feet short and ran his birdie attempt to tie Poston 10 feet past the hole. He missed, made bogey and watched Simpson make birdie to finish solo second.
Poston picked the right day to tie his career low round — 62 — eight-under at Sedgefield. He went all week without making a bogey, shooting 65-65-66 for the first three days. That’s the first time a player has gone 72 holes without a bogey on the PGA Tour since Lee Trevino did that at the 1974 New Orleans event. (No it wasn’t the Zurich Classic back then!).
The 25-year-old third-year player hit 14 greens and had just 25 putts on his way to his first win. “We had some good numbers with the wedge,” Poston said, as his short-iron play set the table for victory. “Any win is a dream come true,” he said. He finished in front of a large number of friends and family who drove to Greensboro for the final round.
“I had a lot of friends come in,” Poston pointed out. “To win in front of them is something I couldn’t imagine.”
The win pushed Poston into the top 20 on the FedEx points list. He’s 27th heading for the Northern Trust and two decent weeks can get him into the Tour Championship for the first time in his short career.
